Atheism, Evolution, Skepticism

Saudi Cleric: OK for 10 year-old girls to marry

There seems to be something about fundamentalist religion that makes people dumb – particularly when the entire culture is immersed in it. A few days ago, this was in the news:

“It is incorrect to say that it’s not permitted to marry off girls who are 15 and younger,” Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Sheikh, the kingdom’s grand mufti, said in remarks quoted Wednesday in the regional Al-Hayat newspaper. “A girl aged 10 or 12 can be married. Those who think she’s too young are wrong and they are being unfair to her.” (Source: CNN)

I like how he tried to flip the script: claiming that people who won’t let a 10 year-old girl be married (or should we say forced into a marriage), those are the people who are being unfair. And who better to judge right and wrong than the top cleric of Islam’s most holy nation on earth?

Although, now that I think about it — Mohammed married Aisha when she was only six or seven years old. I guess that puts Muslims in a very weird position if they try to say child brides are wrong. Kinda sad when you think about it: some guy made up a religion, pulled the wool over a bunch of people’s eyes, and now they have to regard his actions as the paragon of virtue – regardless of what they actually were.

And, of course, the Grand Muftis don’t have a very good track record. Allegedly, Ibn Baz (the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia) stated that that the earth is flat back in 1993 – and everyone claiming otherwise should be punished for being an infidel. He has since denied that claim, asserting that he “only” claimed that the earth is stationary while the moon and sun revolve around it (and using the Quran as the basis for that claim). So, suck on that Galileo!